Back to the basics… In 1974, the University of Southern California football team trailed Notre Dame 24-6 at halftime. The game was over. But USC returned to the basics and the second half was very different. 2009 is halftime for Darwinism. It enjoys an impressive lead defining reality today. But if we return to basics,…
Efficiency & effectiveness You can make a baby in a minute. But you can’t make love in a minute. Either way can be effective if all you want is a baby. The first method wins on efficiency – takes less time and uses less energy. Many folks, however, find making a baby distasteful. For those…
Efficiency & effectiveness You can make a baby in a minute. But you can’t make love in a minute. Either way can be effective if all you want is a baby. The first method wins on efficiency – takes less time and uses less energy. Many folks, however, find making a baby distasteful. For those…
Failure to flinch… In today’s touchy world of tolerance, people recoil at being told they’re lost. It’s an affront to suggest that someone is arrogant. It’s intolerant to tell a friend that Jesus is the way. Yet this past week, tens of millions of people – many who wouldn’t darken the door of a church…
Mind or muscles? Thomas Edison said great ideas originate in the muscles. Kant, Descartes, Hegel – and most Western Christians – say great ideas originate in the mind. Jesus probably doesn’t care if great ideas come from the mind, muscles, or your mom’s minestrone. But he might say Edison knew something that faith communities don’t.
Missing two leaflets… When you imagine the expansion of Christianity, where is the geographical center in AD400? …600? …800? Most of us imagine a straight line – from Jerusalem to the Mediterranean to Europe. But Christianity from its earliest days blossomed like a three-leaf clover, expanding first into Asia and Africa before Europe. The Asian…
Flanking strategy… Darwin might be 2009’s debate du jour. This year is the 150th anniversary of On the Origin of the Species and there will be plenty of Christians attacking Darwin. What if we instead adopted a flanking strategy, just as Darwin did after he published Origin? He explained familiar experiences, but I bet we…
Occupational hazard One way to learn if you have halitosis is to get hitched. I was blissfully unaware of my morning mouth until I got married. Scientists say we don’t smell our own breath odor due to a biological process called habituation – we become comfy with our bad breath but can’t bear bad breath…
Slithering and sinister The stories of Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, and Jesus’ birth originally featured slithering princes. Snow White’s prince slipped in and locked himself away with her dead body. The prince in Sleeping Beauty slithered in while she slept and got her pregnant. The prince in the Christmas story, however, was a darker, more…
Waiting in the wings… Lee Iacocca guessed that Ford would sell 100,000 Mustangs in the first year of production. They sold over 100,000 in the first four months. Yet the 1965 Mustang wouldn’t have changed the auto industry without two improvements that were waiting in the wings. This is a story of what faith communities…